Margaret M. (“Peggy”) J.D. ’79, has been given a warm tribute by the quarterly journal Directors & Boards.

The special feature article called Foran, the chief governance officer and corporate secretary of Prudential Financial, “the rare individual who has earned the respect of all constituencies in the ongoing governance debates.”

The University of Notre Dame has been selected as the U.S. partner in a British Leverhulme Trust initiative to take part in an international network considering the intersection of families and the state from interdisciplinary and comparative perspectives.

Professor Margaret Brinig, the Fritz Duda Family Chair in Law, has been asked by the British participants to direct and organize the third of the project’s four workshops. In making the appointment, the Trust noted that Professor Brinig is well known for her interdisciplinary and empirical focus and for her experience in international family law organizations. The workshop will take place at Notre Dame and involve principals from the U.K. and Australia as well as a number of scholars from Notre Dame’s College of Arts and Letters and family law experts from around the U.S. to be selected by Professor Brinig.

Since joining NDLS in 2000, Bellia has become well known to students for teaching popular courses in Administrative Law, Constitutional Law, and Cyberlaw, and to colleagues for being among the faculty’s best scholars (she has published numerous articles on Internet law and separation of powers and is the co-author of a leading cyberlaw casebook).

Perhaps less well known is that she is also in her third year as the University’s Faculty Athletics Representative to the NCAA and Chair of the University’s 15-member Faculty Board on Athletics. In that role, Bellia oversees the principal advisory group to the President on educational issues related to intercollegiate athletics. She also works closely with the football, volleyball, and women’s tennis programs as each team’s faculty liaison.

To recognize her for outstanding contributions to the academic performance of Notre Dame student-athletes, athletics director Jack Swarbrick surprised Bellia with an honorary Monogram at the Notre Dame Football Awards Show December 9 in the DeBartolo Performing Arts Center.

Joining Swarbrick on stage for the presentation were Monogram Club president Dick Nussbaum (‘74, ’77), executive director Beth Hunter, Bellia’s husband, A.J., and daughters, Kate and Molly. > Read More

The Emeritus Fellowships honor faculty across the United States who, after their official retirements, continue “active and productive” scholarship in the humanities and humanistic social sciences.

Professor Kommers’ project will examine the country’s constitution, called the Basic Law of the Federal Republic of Germany, within the framework of Germany’s political development from 1949 to the present. > Read the full story

Professor Paolo Carozza participated in the Second Seminar of the Catholic-Muslim Forum on November 21 – 23, held at the site of Jesus’ baptism in Jordan.

Carozza was one of 24 Catholics invited to attend the seminar by the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, headed by Cardinal Jean-François Tauran. Twenty-four prominent Muslim religious leaders and scholars also attended, led by H.R.H. Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad of Jordan.

The First Seminar, whose theme was “Love of God, Love of Neighbour: The Dignity of the Human Person and Mutual Respect,” took place in Rome in 2008. This year’s theme was “Reason, Faith, and the Human Person.” > Read More

Professor Mary Ellen O’Connell has agreed to participate in a bipartisan, off-the-record, bicameral staff briefing in the Capitol Visitor Center on the use of armed drones in conflict areas. At the December 9 briefing, Prof. O’Connell will be asked to discuss the current use of drones, the legal and ethical ramifications of the technology’s use, and the future of drone warfare from a strategic and moral perspective.

To examine the challenge of adapting our constitutional values to future technology that was unimaginable at the time of the nation’s founding, the conference will consider the scenarios posed by Professor Snead and other contributors to the book Constitution 3.0: Freedom and Technological Change (Brookings Institution Press, 2011). Read More

Sofía Galván Puente, a 2009 graduate of Notre Dame Law School’s LL.M. degree program in international human rights law, will receive the National Youth Award of 2011 for Human Rights. The award recognizes Mexican youth “whose career trajectory, commitment, or study brings honor to their generation and inspires individual or community progress.” Mexican President Felipe Calderon will personally present Ms. Galván with the award, a gold medal, in December 2011.